Change
by The Velvet Inch
Summary: After moving to America to try and rid herself of the tragedy that her life had thrown at her back in Japan, a young woman finds herself slowly learning how empty she's truly become. She finds herself in love, and scared that she still won't be saved.


She opened her eyes, squinting against the light that was sneaking through the hideous green curtains of her even more hideous little hotel room. Throwing back the covers, she let out an involuntary shiver as the cool air hit her virtually naked body. She tried to ignore how cold it was, wondering when, exactly, she might have opened the window last night. Getting to her feet, she crossed over to peer out at the street below, moving the disgusting curtains aside to do so. It was snowing-- practically a blizzard-- and it made her wonder just how drunk she must have been to have opened the window; she tried to shut it, but it was frozen in place. Cursing under her breath, she went back to the bed to snatch up one of the pillows, going back to the window and barely managing to shove it into the open space.

Looking over to the alarm at her bedside, she was shocked to find out that it was two in the afternoon, though that explained why it was so bright out. She looked for something to cover the window up with, finding the glare of the sun to be rather painful on her eyes now so used to darkness, and she came up with nothing. The towels in her bathroom would be dark enough, but they certainly weren't big enough to cover the entire space. When she had lost al hope of being able to get rid of the light, her eyes fell upon the blanket crumpled at the foot of the bed-- the _black_ blanket crumpled at the foot of the bed.

She grabbed it up, clambering onto the dresser near the window and proceeding to hang it from the curtain rod. As she moved to get back down, she slipped on the cool surface of the dresser and fell to the floor, just barely avoiding cracking her jaw off of it. The carpet was rough against her skin, but she nuzzled her face against it; tired and seeking some form of comfort that she knew would never appear.

She was so exhausted, completely positive that she would nod off any moment now, and the thought of that terrified her. The dreamless sleep that she had been blessed with not ten minutes ago was almost definitely not to return, and she certainly didn't feel like immersing herself in the nightmare that had haunted her mind for the past two years. She felt sick just thinking of it, and her skin was no longer clammy and cold from the winter's harsh breeze, but out of fear.

Curling up into as tight a ball as she could manage, she wished that she could just disappear right into herself and find a way to make everything better, but she knew that she would never be able to do that. She knew that she was cursed-- or at least, very strongly believed that she was cursed-- to stay miserable and alone forever, plagued by memories of what she could confidently call the worst thing to ever happen to her; maybe even the worst thing to ever happen to anybody.

Her eyelids felt as if they were made of lead, and as they slowly fell shut, she knew that struggling any further to remain conscious would just be silly. As she slipped off into oblivion, her last conscious thought was a rather desperate cry for help that nobody was around to answer, and then she was gone. Gone and back again to the place she hated most.

It was dark, as dark as her room had been, but it felt darker, somehow; she couldn't see anything, but she knew that, were she to reach out to either side of her, she would meet the cold glass in which she was encased. She could feel them crawling and squirming all around her, and while it was a feeling that would make any normal person sick, she was so used to it, as if she had grown up with it all her life.

The insects were one thing, but knowing hat she was trapped was another. Every time that she let herself sleep, she was stuck with this feeling like she would never wake, and that scared her almost as much as the intense feeling of being alone that waited for her whenever she _would_ manage to open her eyes. But, as always, she didn't think that that was going to happen this time: she thought that her eyes would stay closed, and that she would be trapped in her mind and her memories forever-- not just for the rest of her life, but until the end of time. Longer, maybe.

The bugs were all over her, now, and she had to close her mouth, clench her eyes shut and clamp a hand over her nose; pressing one ear against her shoulder and covering the other with the free hand. It was an almost natural reaction for her, even though she knew that, in a dram, she would be able to breathe through the insects if they were to get down her throat, and that she would be able to see if there had been anything around to see. Despite hating where her dreams always took her, she felt some violent need to make it seem as real as possible; as if it were happening all over again and her life was honestly still in danger.

Her lungs were burning from holding her breath so long, or she was at least imagining that they were. Her skin itched from the multitude of tiny creatures scurrying along, and then it was suddenly gone. The insects were gone, the glass surrounding her was gone, and the pain in her chest had vanished. Her eyes opened, and she saw him standing before her with a smile on his face. She was very relaxed all of a sudden, and she reached out to touch him. He avoided her hand, that comforting smile on his face becoming elusive, and the shadows that shrouded the rest of his features slowly growing. She wished that she knew his name, so that she could properly ask him why he wouldn't let her near him, but she had never known his name, and never known his real face, either.

That was a lie. She was lying to herself-- she had known his face, but only once, and that time felt as if it was so long ago.. His face had been revealed to her the only time she had ever found herself thinking that she might be in love; a feeling which had lasted only for a brief moment of time. Back then, the man in her dream-- a dream she had been having since she was twelve-- had appeared before her as Jonouchi Katsuya.

Thinking back to it now, she was embarrassed to admit even to herself that she had ever had cared in such a way for that man-- that boy, really: he had been sixteen at the time. When she tried to figure out why she had even developed feelings like that for him, she found that all signs pointed to it being something highly influenced by how alone she had always felt. This, of course, meant that she could have fallen for any of them-- the ones that had become her friends, even for such a short amount of time. Katsuya had been the one who had paid the most attention to her-- seemed the most worried and concerned whenever something went wrong. It made perfect sense that she had loved him, rather than Yuugi, Honda, or even Otogi.

Her thoughts were soon interrupted by the sensation of somebody's hand at the small of her back, and her eyes came back into focus on the faceless man before her. He was pulling her close, body soon pressed against hers. It was all so familiar to her, but there was something different this time; something that was making her unbearably uncomfortable: something wrong.

The gentle touch that had often soothed her so long ago was now menacing to her, and something about it told her that she had best avoid looking up to that shadowed face. Something was telling her that there would definitely be somebody there who she would not want to see.

She tried to get away from him, but to no avail: the arms encircling her waist were strong and, in a way, seemed very confident in how they were holding her. The way that he was making her feel was awful, and her body was shaking against his. She had broken out into a cold sweat, and was only now noticing from how soaked in it she felt she must be. She had to get away. She had to find some way to run as far from him as possible, and-- there! An opening-- brief, but it was there-- and she had managed to break free of his embrace as he shifted his grip on her. Backing up into the void surrounding them, and keeping her eyes on what would have been the ground as she did.

It must have been his warmth that tipped her off, as she felt as if he may be following her-- coming closer. He was a foot away from her. Four inches. Two. His hand reached for her face, and even though she could feel it coming, she made no attempt to avoid it. She knew that, no matter how hard she tried, it would not work. Not in her dreams-- not while now all she was used to was suffering.

Strong fingers grasped at her chin, his palm supporting it as he forced her head back, trying to get her to look at his face; she kept her eyes locked on his chest. There was a calm voice in her ear as he spoke unintelligible words to her-- his tone a soft, coaxing one.

The sound of that perfect voice was slowly chipping away at what little willpower of hers remained, and she didn't feel like trying to strengthen it, knowing that such an attempt would be futile. Her mind was no longer telling her to gaze to avoid his, and, simple as that, she looked up at him-- into his eyes. She screamed.

She woke, still screaming, and her eyes snapped open to stare into the inky blackness before her. She started to panic, thinking that she might still be asleep. What if her dream was just saying she was awake? What if he was waiting for her? Her whole body gave a shiver at the mere thought of looking into those horrible eyes again, and she made herself sit up.

A blast of cool air against her chest gave her no doubt that she really was awake, and she slowly and unsteadily rose to her feet, finding her way to the bathroom through the darkness, flicking the light on and stopping to squint for a few minutes, allowing her eyes time to adjust.

The linoleum beneath her bare feet was colder than usual, and she mentally cursed herself again for whatever had possessed her to open the window the night before. She curled her toes in an attempt to keep her feet at least remotely warm, and moved to stand in front of the sink; ignoring the broken mirror as she turned the tap on and leaned over to splash her face with lukewarm water.

Straightening, she grabbed a towel from the rack beside the sink, and sat down on the edge of the bathtub. Her eyes found their way to her rather battered and bruised left hand, and she could feel a frown tugging at the corners of her lips. She had punched the mirror a few days ago, and couldn't remember why. It had most likely been in one of her too-common fits of either rage or depression, but she couldn't be too sure about which, and she was hating not knowing. Her memory had become increasingly worse over the past year or so, and it was killing her.

Her hand was aching. She rose to check an see if she might have any painkillers left in the medicine cabinet. There was nothing. As she closed the cabinet door, she caught a glimpse of herself in a few of the broken shards of mirror. She almost gasped from what she saw, as she had been avoiding looking at herself properly for just over six months; what she saw and what she had been expecting were to entirely different things.

Her eyes seemed dead, and had somehow gone from a once-magnificent shade of violet to a very dull grey; her hair had become a much darker blonde, and was, for the most part, very flat and lifeless. She lifted a hand to her amazingly pale cheek, and felt her e yes go wide. She was staring at the empty shell of a woman-- she was almost an entirely different person. She thought she might cry, but felt no tears itching at the corners of her eyes.

It was then that she knew she really was crazy.

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Aaahh... to continue, or not to continue.. Feedback, please?


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